Against the Sudden Bright – Richard King Perkins II

A newfound anti-algorithm will either bring us together
or prevent us from ever meeting.

We are muted orange and neither of us
is to be believed; burdened by deniers that our mutual vision
somehow extends across solder shades and antimony countryside.

My mouth is hypergothic, licking wildly at the candies
of your lavish, distant gift. We unmake worlds
into unique forms so that we can be both relevant and meaningless.

Your gentle ellipse succumbs to almost hands,
quelled by the disrespect of shroudsmiths and light invasive.
You stand in fields of hematite and ethereal sacrosanct,
plying everlasting fabrications, and still, you are merciful.

Mastodons graze somewhere in exquisite assembly,
swallowing pink-hued clouds and subterranean fungi.
If I never find you there, it wasn’t for lack of trying.

I partially exist in a diesel-scented world of unscrupulous possibilities,
all oyster-gray and mourning lace, where your voice whispers
so softly as to be almost unheard. Even when the last vibration

ceases to be, we will have another wholly unrelated future
in which to make the same mistakes repeatedly.